MORGANTOWN, WEST VIRGINIA—The recent federal indictment of former Massey Energy chief Donald L. Blankenship for violating health and safety laws is unprecedented says a West Virginia University law professor who contributed to a 2011 state report on the Upper Big Branch Mine disaster that found the company directly responsible for the blast that killed 29 miners in 2010.
Massey owned the Upper Big Branch mine where a methane gas explosion spread through two miles of tunnel, killing the miners.
“Those responsible for managing mines in a way that caused multiple deaths were never held responsible,” Patrick McGinley, the Charles H. Haden II Professor of Law, told The New York Times. “It shocks the conscience.”
The explosion fed on illegally high levels of coal dust, according to reports, and federal prosecutors have accused Blankenship of ignoring health and safety laws to maximize profits while covering up violations.
McGinley served as a member of then-Gov. Joe Manchin’s investigative team that explored the failure of basic coal mine safety practices at the Upper Big Branch Mine disaster.
McGinley is available to the media to offer commentary on the Upper Big Branch Mine disaster, the indictment of Blankenship, as well as mine safety issues, black lung and the environmental impact of mining operations. McGinley can be reached via email at Patrick.McGinley@mail.wvu.edu or by phone at 304-293-6823.
“Energy Law: A Context and Practice Casebook” (Carolina Academic Press, 2014) covers energy-focused topics such as economic regulations, mineral rights, market structures, and environmental concerns.
“Energy law is actually kind of hard to define, and one of the things that I think my book helps show is that it’s . . . an amalgam of a variety of different areas,” said Fershee in an interview with New Books in Law.
“Energy Law: A Context and Practice Casebook” is part of the Context and Practice Series, edited by Michael Hunter Schwartz, Professor of Law and Dean of the University of Arkansas at Little Rock Bowen School of Law.
MORGANTOWN, WEST VIRGINIA—Several WVU Law students recently presented bills they had researched and drafted to state legislators. The practical experience was the culmination of Lawyers & Legislation, a seminar taught by Professor of Law David Hardesty, WVU President Emeritus.
The mock legislative hearings were conducted before West Virginia state senators Robert Beach and Amanda Pasdon, and former delegate Alex J. Shook ‘97.
The students’ bills ranged from banning revenge porn and requiring lower teacher-student ratios in public schools to legalizing marijuana and prohibiting employment and housing discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and identity.
Rebekah Bofinger, a 3L, says she got a lot out of the class because it required practical drafting skills instead of writing a research paper on a certain area of law.
MORGANTOWN, WEST VIRGINIA — WVU Law professor is co-author “Mastering Labor Law” (Carolina Academic Press).
“We take the complicated legal foundations of labor law and makes them accessible to the beginner – or even to a lay person – while still being of significant use to the expert,” said Lofaso, who also serves as associate dean for faculty research and development at WVU Law.”It is one of the few labor law books to include significant discussion of public-sector labor law, making it a leader among labor law treatises.”
“Mastering Labor Law” begins with an introduction to private and public sector labor law. It then turns to United States labor history and procedure, organization, and jurisdiction issues under the National Labor Relations Act. The book then comprehensively addresses the organizational and collective bargaining processes, before covering forms of protected activity. It closes by considering other topics such as labor arbitration, union security clause, labor preemption, and antitrust doctrine.
The other co-authors of “Mastering Labor Law” are Paul M. Secunda, Professor of Law and Director of the Labor and Employment Law Program at Marquette University Law School, Joseph E. Slater, the Eugene N. Balk Professor of Law and Values at the University of Toledo College of Law, and Jeffrey M. Hirsch, Associate Dean for Academic Affairs, and Geneva Yeargan Rand Distinguished Professor of Law at the University of North Carolina School of Law.
MORGANTOWN, WEST VIRGINIA—West Virginia University College of Law Professor Patrick McGinley recently participated in the fourth annual Carver Colloquium at the University of Denver Sturm School of Law.
The topic of the colloquium was fracking bans and setbacks and whether or not they constitute a takings—the seizure of private property by the government for public use. McGinley debated the issue Wayne Forman, a land, oil and gas attorney with the firm Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck.
Constitutional Takings Jurisprudence is a focus of McGinley’s legal scholarship. His article “Regulatory Takings in the Shale Gas Patch” was published in the Penn State Environmental Law Review (19 Penn St. Envtl. L. Rev. 193).
Each year, the Carver Colloquium features two notable land use, environmental, and natural resources law scholars. It is hosted by the Rocky Mountain Land Use Institute and Jan Laitos, the John A. Carver, Jr. Chair at the University of Denver Sturm College of Law, in partnership with the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy.
Video footage of the 2014 Carver Colloquium featuring McGinley can be viewed here.
Admission is free and the public is invited to attend. A reception in the College of Law lobby will follow the lecture.
For his lecture, Post will address the constitutionality of compelled commercial speech. Recent cases of compelled commercial speech include government mandates for country-of-origin labeling on meat products and graphic warnings on tobacco products.
In addition to serving as dean, Post is the Sol & Lillian Goldman Professor of Law at Yale, where he teaches on constitutional law, the First Amendment, legal history, and equal protection. He has written and edited several books and his work is regularly published in a variety of legal journals. Post’s paper on compelled commercial speech will be published in the West Virginia Law Review in 2015.
The Baker Lecture at WVU Law is presented annually in honor of C. Edwin Baker, a leading constitutional law scholar who died in 2009. He was the Nicholas F. Gallicchio Professor of Law and Communication at the University of Pennsylvania Law School.
In 2011, Baker’s family donated his papers to the West Virginia University College of Law. Housed in the George R. Famer, Jr. Law Library, the C. Edwin Baker Collection is a window into the life and work of one of the 20th century’s foremost experts on constitutional law, free speech, and communication law.
MORGANTOWN, WEST VIRGINIA — The West Virginia University College of Law is hosting an admissions event for prospective minority and non-traditional students from 9:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. on Saturday, November 8.
Registration for Bridging the Gap is free and includes lunch. It is open to aspiring law students and offers opportunities to meet with current law students and faculty. The program will focus on the law school application process, academic offerings, student life, and financial aid. Participants will also experience a simulation of a first-year law class.
WVU College of Law is ranked #83 among the best law schools in the country by U.S. News & World Report. With a focus on justice, ethics, and professionalism, WVU Law focuses on the development of practice-ready skills through experiences in and out of the classroom. The employment rate forWVU Law graduates is higher than the national average.
MORGANTOWN, WEST VIRGINIA — The
West Virginia University College of Law is hosting a free seminar for
inventors, entrepreneurs, business owners, and lawyers on Thursday, November 6,
from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. in the Marlyn E. Lugar Courtroom. Lunch will be provided.
Organized by the WVU
Entrepreneurship & Innovation Law Clinic (EILC), the seminar
will focus on intellectual property (IP) law. Panel discussions will include IP
attorneys Dusty Gwinn of Handheld Hospitality LLC, Monika Hussell of Dinsmore
& Shohl LLP, and Michael Smith of Birch, Stewart, Kolasch & Birch LLP.
The lunch keynote address will be delivered by Craig Morris, managing attorney for
Trademark Outreach with the United States Patent and Trademark Office. He will
speak on “Trademark Basics: What Every Small Business Should Know Now, Not Later.”
“This seminar will instruct the inventor, entrepreneur and business owner, and their
consultants and lawyers in how to assess and protect IP, so that the company may
successfully commercialize in today’s marketplace,” said Nancy Trudel, EILC interim
director. “It also will provide attendees with information on the private and public
resources available in West Virginia that may assist with IP protection and business
development.”
MORGANTON, WEST VIRGINIA— Top labor scholars and leaders are meeting at the West Virginia University College of Law on Friday, October 24, for a conference focused on ensuring a healthy and productive environment for workers in the United States.
Titled Zealous Advocacy for Social Change, the labor law conference is open to the public from 8:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. and from 4:15 p.m. to 6:15 p.m. at the College of Law. Admission is free.
In the morning session in Lugar Courtroom, panelists will discuss the legal setting for the current anti-union environment, including labor’s assembly rights, and trends and updates.
Presenters include Lynn Rhinehart, general counsel of the AFL-CIO; Nicole Berner, deputy general counsel for the Service Employees International Union; Christopher Williamson, labor counsel for U.S. Senate H.E.L.P. Committee, and Marion Crain, vice provost at Washington University in St. Louis.
MORGANTOWN, WEST VIRGINIA— A West Virginia University law professor says that the proposed Environmental Protection Agency’s rules to regulate power plant emissions will have a disproportionate impact on coal-dependent regions of the country, such as West Virginia, but do provide some flexibility.
The proposed Clean Power Plan rules, issued by the EPA this summer, would regulate greenhouse gas emissions from existing power plants.
“Using the authority granted under the Clean Air Act to regulate greenhouse gas emissions is not an ideal solution,” said James Van Nostrand, director of the Center for Energy and Sustainable Development at the WVU College of Law. “A legislative solution would likely have included measures to provide some relief to regions of the country that are hit particularly hard by the rules. EPA lacks the resources and authority to provide that relief.”
However, Van Nostrand pointed out, EPA’s Clean Power Plan gives states leeway in deciding how to meet the required reductions in greenhouse gas emissions. “The EPA took into consideration each state’s existing power generation characteristics in developing emissions reductions targets,” he said. “As a result, West Virginia is required to achieve a 20 percent reduction in carbon intensity by 2030 from a 2012 baseline, which is a lower target than the 30 percent national target from a 2005 baseline.”
Van Nostrand notes that the options available to West Virginia to meet the 20 percent reduction goal included improving the operating efficiency of existing coal plants, integrating more renewable energy into the generating mix, and ramping up the energy efficiency programs offered by utilities.
